Larger search text area

Could I make a plea for a longer search text area?

Longer queries are difficult to see as they can be longer than the text area:

IE: ((@start <= 2015-11-25) or not @start or (@due <= 2015-12-02)) and not @done

I wonder whether you could give the search text area some more thought? I ask that because it would be good to have a query builder where you can drag and drop tags, dates and key words. Even if that doesn’t pan out, the search area is going to be one of the main areas people will be in with large documents and could do with some more visual space.

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Yes—agreed, I would love to see more search text at once.

Also, I am crazy about the idea of a query builder!! I have thought about that before but not been sure what to call it. I am a pretty capable user, but with all the node path syntax and logical operators, I can get pretty turned around. Honestly, I think anything but very simple queries would be pretty much impossible for less experienced users. But a query builder would really be a game changer here.

I’ve given the search bar a larger maximum size for the next release.

I think a query builder isn’t likely. At least writing one from scratch would take a bunch of work, and I don’t think I can reuse the existing OS X query builder (like Mail.app uses) because from what I can see that’s only for joining together a bunch of conditions. TaskPaper queries can be hierarchical which I don’t think fits into that sort of UI.

If anyone can point to a good xpath query builder let me know … that could be a good starting point. In the meantime if you’ve got a query question please feel free to post here.

Can I be a pain and ask for an even larger area? I have a series of searches set in textexpander, but tweak them in the search bar which is pretty difficult, not being able to see the whole term. Here’s an example of the type of search:

@due >= %Y-%m-%d and not @due > %@+7D%Y-%m-%d and not @done

Some searches are more complex!

You would think this would be simple. Must be simple actually… but for some reason I can’t get cocoa to show me a larger search field. I messed around with this in interface builder for longer then I would like to admit. Anyway it’s still on my list, and I’ll get back to it at some point with fresh eyes and hopefully find the simple answer.